On Monday 20th May, several of the AVATAR team, including Prof Claire Rickard, Dr Gillian Ray-Barruel, Assoc Prof Amanda Ullman, Jessica Schults , and Dr Vineet Chopra (University of Michigan) met with Dr Hideto Yasuda from Kameda General Hospital, Chiba, and Keio University School of Medicine, Japan. Dr Yasuda is an emergency and critical care physician and researcher with a keen desire to improve the outcomes for patients with peripheral vascular access. Dr Yasuda was introduced to the ...

  Congratulations to AVATAR's Pocket Rocket, Paediatric Vascular Access Nurse Practitioner, Tricia Kleidon, RN, BSC(NURSING), GRADCERT(PEDIATRICS), MNURSSCI(NURSEPRAC)!   This year the Association of Vascular Access and the Pediatric Special Interest Group recognizes Tricia Kleidon, RN, NursPrac, as the 2019 Dr. Janet Pettit Scholar. Ms. Kleidon is a Nurse Practitioner in Pediatric Vascular Assessment and Management at Queensland Children's Hospital in...

Up to 70% of acute care hospital patients need a peripheral intravenous catheter (PIVC) for fluids or medicines.(1) Yet, up to 69% of PIVCs have painful complications or stop working before treatment is finished, requiring the insertion of a new device.(2) Device failure is painful for patients and time-consuming for staff, and can lead to increased morbidity, prolonged length of stay, and higher hospital costs.(2) Regular, systematic assessment could help with prevention and early detec...

Expressions of Interest
Editor in Chief Vascular Access
Commencing May 2019
Key Objectives:   Guide the overall strategic direction of Vascular Access, in consultation with the AVAS board and the publisher
  Maintain a high level of quality in the manuscript review and journal editing process
  Provide appropriate and timely communication to authors.
  Screen all manuscripts submitted for publication to en...

  Dear Vascular Access Clinicians

Please find attached an invitation to attend a webinar presented by Stephanie Pitts, Global Director of Clinical Marketing, Angiodynamics and Vascular Access Team Nurse, St. Joseph's Children's Hospital.  Stephanie has worked in vascular access for over 20 years, she is a dynamic and motivating speaker and advocate for reducing the number of vascular access devices and insertion attempts in our vulnerable paediatric patients.&nbs...

Webinar Invitation
July 12, 2018 3M Health Care Academy Webinar Series Speaker: Dr Nancy Moureau The most frequent invasive procedure performed by nurses in acute care is venous access with 80%
of patients in the USA, requiring intravenous access for treatment. High usage of VADs, both central
and peripheral, is not without risk of infection or other complications.
Concerns regarding catheter-associated bloodstream infections are common with a general focus on
central...

Before withdrawing a blood aspirate from a central venous access device (CVAD), ask yourself, why am I taking this blood aspirate? Are you taking the blood aspirate to assess for device patency prior to hooking up to an intravenous infusion or do you require a blood sample for laboratory analysis? If you are simply checking CVAD patency you only need to pull blood back into the catheter until you see the liquid gold; it never needs to come as far as the catheter hub and needleless conn...

VASCULAR ACCESS, April edition of the peer-reviewed multidisciplinary official journal of the Australian Vascular Access Society (AVAS) is now available!   Table of contents Woods C, Ray-Barruel G, Marsh N, Flynn J, Larsen E, Rickard CM. Registered nurses' experiences of using four methods of peripheral intravenous catheter dressings and securement during a randomised controlled trial. A survey. Vascular Access 2018;4(1) Abstract: Background: Peripheral intrave...